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Until they stop offering the service 5 years later when you feel like revisiting an old game.

Oh well in that case you download the patch that removes the copy protection.

Honestly, it is such a non issue.

With EA's track record for product support? I scoff at this. Don't misunderstood, I'd love to be proven wrong. But until I am...

Oh well worst case scenario you crack the game with an illegal crack.

Either way, you will still be able to play your game.

So of course EA will not want this, so they will either release a patch or change the DRM.
The onus is on them to do something, because one way or another you will be playing and reinstalling your game.

Until they stop offering the service 5 years later when you feel like revisiting an old game.

Oh well in that case you download the patch that removes the copy protection.

Honestly, it is such a non issue.

With EA's track record for product support? I scoff at this. Don't misunderstood, I'd love to be proven wrong. But until I am...

Oh well worst case scenario you crack the game with an illegal crack.

Either way, you will still be able to play your game.

So of course EA will not want this, so they will either release a patch or change the DRM.
The onus is on them to do something, because one way or another you will be playing and reinstalling your game.

And if downloading said crack carries a CDN$20,000 fine thanks to asinine new copyright laws, is that still worth it?

It sucks though. I dont want to turn to an illegal crack just cause EA doesnt know how to keep up with it's current games. Fuck, even Blizzard releases updates for Diablo I and II. Do you have any idea how old those games are?

Until they stop offering the service 5 years later when you feel like revisiting an old game.

Oh well in that case you download the patch that removes the copy protection.

Honestly, it is such a non issue.

With EA's track record for product support? I scoff at this. Don't misunderstood, I'd love to be proven wrong. But until I am...

Oh well worst case scenario you crack the game with an illegal crack.

Either way, you will still be able to play your game.

So of course EA will not want this, so they will either release a patch or change the DRM.
The onus is on them to do something, because one way or another you will be playing and reinstalling your game.

And if downloading said crack carries a CDN$20,000 fine thanks to asinine new copyright laws, is that still worth it?

I'm not advocating piracy.

But the fact that the only option for people to play the game would be an illegal course guarantees EA can't stop supporting the game. They are on thin ground as it is with the community.

So of course EA will not want this, so they will either release a patch or change the DRM.
The onus is on them to do something, because one way or another you will be playing and reinstalling your game.

Really? Why do you say that?

I'd like to think that it's their responsibility to release a patch, but they sure as crap don't have to. Why should they go to the extra effort to release a patch to fix issues in the DRM for an old game? I can think of several reasons not to:

a) Few people even want to play anymore

b) It's extra cost for no real benefit

c) Re-enabling people to play older games does nothing for your profits and may take away sales from current franchises (this in particular applies to the sports games)

d) You can just wait and hope that the cracker community will do it instead of you having to. They do it for free, why should we go to the cost then?

I don't see any particular reason for them to. Neither have they even mentioned anything along those lines themselves. If they had, then I might have at least considered the possibility that they would do so. At the moment, my view is several miles below "sceptical".

They didn't disable their DRM for any of their previous sports games. You need to verify through their centralised server before you can play their game online. That's been switched off now so you can't play against other people. Doesn't matter that EA wasn't actually hosting any games, they were just verfiying the copies. Without that being possible, you can't play.

Unless of course you update to the latest game in the series. The servers for that are still running.

Now take this mechanic, and extend it to singleplayer games, for the same reason (verification).

I'm not advocating piracy.

But the fact that the only option for people to play the game would be an illegal course guarantees EA can't stop supporting the game. They are on thin ground as it is with the community.

Whilst breaking the DRM is illegal, leaving that aside, how are they on thin ground if a few people want to play a 5 year old game but can't? I wouldn't even put that in the top 10 of forum nerd rage, especially when the vast majority of their audience is on console to begin with. What exactly are they going to do, burn EA down because their games won't run? Start a lawsuit? I can't see what exactly EA are sacrificing here except a few disgruntled customers who will still likely buy the next game coming. Given that situation, if I were EA, I wouldn't even see the point in bothering to spend resources to address it.

I'm not saying that's a good thing, but I'm saying it's understandable.

So of course EA will not want this, so they will either release a patch or change the DRM.
The onus is on them to do something, because one way or another you will be playing and reinstalling your game.

Really? Why do you say that?

I'd like to think that it's their responsibility to release a patch, but they sure as crap don't have to. Why should they go to the extra effort to release a patch to fix issues in the DRM for an old game? I can think of several reasons not to:

a) Few people even want to play anymore

b) It's extra cost for no real benefit

c) Re-enabling people to play older games does nothing for your profits and may take away sales from current franchises (this in particular applies to the sports games)

d) You can just wait and hope that the cracker community will do it instead of you having to. They do it for free, why should we go to the cost then?

I don't see any particular reason for them to. Neither have they even mentioned anything along those lines themselves. If they had, then I might have at least considered the possibility that they would do so. At the moment, my view is several miles below "sceptical".

They didn't disable their DRM for any of their previous sports games. You need to verify through their centralised server before you can play their game online. That's been switched off now so you can't play against other people. Doesn't matter that EA wasn't actually hosting any games, they were just verfiying the copies. Without that being possible, you can't play.

Unless of course you update to the latest game in the series. The servers for that are still running.

Now take this mechanic, and extend it to singleplayer games, for the same reason (verification).

I'm not advocating piracy.

But the fact that the only option for people to play the game would be an illegal course guarantees EA can't stop supporting the game. They are on thin ground as it is with the community.

Whilst breaking the DRM is illegal, leaving that aside, how are they on thin ground if a few people want to play a 5 year old game but can't? I wouldn't even put that in the top 10 of forum nerd rage, especially when the vast majority of their audience is on console to begin with. What exactly are they going to do, burn EA down because their games won't run? Start a lawsuit? I can't see what exactly EA are sacrificing here except a few disgruntled customers who will still likely buy the next game coming. Given that situation, if I were EA, I wouldn't even see the point in bothering to spend resources to address it.

I'm not saying that's a good thing, but I'm saying it's understandable.

Spoilered for length.

Thank god for companies that love their customers. Blizzard and Valve fanboy for life.

The onus is on EA. Some people want them to do something, they get to decide to do it or not.
Like I said, I dont care. EA almost certainly will do it because, I mean, why the hell not? The reasons you listed as to why they wouldn't are outweighed by several things:

1) It is incredibly easy to remove copy protection from a game via a patch - as pirates have been proving for 10 years.

2) It is a PR boost for them.

3) It costs them nothing. They aren't going to make sales on an old game anyways.

But the fact that the only option for people to play the game would be an illegal course guarantees EA can't stop supporting the game. They are on thin ground as it is with the community.

Neither am I; but to a copyright lawyer, Petey Pirate who warez'd himself a copy on Day One is the same as Honest Ed, who just wants to play his legally purchased game a few years later. And under the proposed Canadian copyright bill, they'd both get the same penalty if caught - $20,000 for downloading a "circumvention device."

And yeah, generic +1 to the "EA? Do something that they don't have to? Bullshit."

Edit:

1) It is incredibly easy to remove copy protection from a game via a patch - as pirates have been proving for 10 years.
True.

2) It is a PR boost for them.
The number of people who will care about the old games is small; the hype machine will be directed on Madden 2012: Now With Real-Time Gatorade Refraction Effects by then.

3) It costs them nothing. They aren't going to make sales on an old game anyways.
It costs them some money to make/push it out, and while they're not going to make sales on old games (though Blizzard and VALVe would beg to differ) people playing old games are people that aren't buying new games.

The onus is on EA. Some people want them to do something, they get to decide to do it or not.
Like I said, I dont care. EA almost certainly will do it because, I mean, why the hell not? The reasons you listed as to why they wouldn't are outweighed by several things:

1) It is incredibly easy to remove copy protection from a game via a patch - as pirates have been proving for 10 years.

2) It is a PR boost for them.

3) It costs them nothing. They aren't going to make sales on an old game anyways.

Factors 1 and 3 are linked. It's easy to remove the DRM, but, and here's the kicker, do they want to? Despite the fact that it doesn't cost much, it still costs resources. Then of course there's also the issue of "Should we really remove our DRM now? Our titles are still on the budget rack. Removing it now would enable people to pirate a game of ours that is still selling!". Or of course, there's also the belief that maintaining older games in the series means that people will have less inclination to move on to the next version. Every little helps right?

I know what the term onus means. I also know that I don't believe that those factors you listed outweigh the costs and resources to enable a game for a small minority of users 5 years down the line. And evidently neither does EA, judging by the fact that the DRM for the multiplayer support in EA's older sports titles was never fixed. I can't understand why that wasn't fixed. If it's as easy as you say it is, and they truly want that positive PR, then why is that DRM still in place? If you can explain that to me then maybe I can understand your standpoint a bit better.

2) It is a PR boost for them.
The number of people who will care about the old games is small; the hype machine will be directed on Madden 2012: Now With Real-Time Gatorade Refraction Effects by then.

You right now are arguing that they won't.

Historically developers have, but EA doesn't really have a history we can point to.

Would you be claiming that EAs DRM was going to prevent you from playing the game 5 years down the line if they had a history of products being patched when support goes out so people can still play them? Offline, since online is a whole different beast.

No, 'cause we'd be able to say "Hey look they did it before" And a lot of the fear of this DRM is that 5 years down the line after a few mobo replacements when EA doesn't support it anymore, they'll not patch it. Let's forget for a second that the developers did, if I'm not mistaken, state that there would be no chance of this happening because the authentication servers are universal, and not per-game, so as long as they have authentication servers they'll support all the games that need them, and that should the servers be taken down they'll patch it, if they had history of supporting games long after their release or patching the DRM out when they no longer were supporting the game, then would we be having this discussion?

Now let's add back in that they've clearly stated that should support be gone for the DRM they'll patch in a workaround.

The onus is on EA. Some people want them to do something, they get to decide to do it or not.
Like I said, I dont care. EA almost certainly will do it because, I mean, why the hell not? The reasons you listed as to why they wouldn't are outweighed by several things:

1) It is incredibly easy to remove copy protection from a game via a patch - as pirates have been proving for 10 years.

2) It is a PR boost for them.

3) It costs them nothing. They aren't going to make sales on an old game anyways.

Factors 1 and 3 are linked. It's easy to remove the DRM, but, and here's the kicker, do they want to? Despite the fact that it doesn't cost much, it still costs resources. Then of course there's also the issue of "Should we really remove our DRM now? Our titles are still on the budget rack. Removing it now would enable people to pirate a game of ours that is still selling!". Or of course, there's also the belief that maintaining older games in the series means that people will have less inclination to move on to the next version. Every little helps right?

I know what the term onus means. I also know that I don't believe that those factors you listed outweigh the costs and resources to enable a game for a small minority of users 5 years down the line. And evidently neither does EA, judging by the fact that the DRM for the multiplayer support in EA's older sports titles was never fixed. I can't understand why that wasn't fixed. If it's as easy as you say it is, and they truly want that positive PR, then why is that DRM still in place? If you can explain that to me then maybe I can understand your standpoint a bit better.

EA is not made up of morons. They know the games are being pirated. They hold no illusion in their minds that the DRM has been cracked. They're not going to avoid removing the DRM when it no longer works because they're afraid it might be pirated. If they do go back on what they've said about removing the DRM should the service ever stop being supported, then it will not be because they're concerned that the pirates might get it.

But the fact that the only option for people to play the game would be an illegal course guarantees EA can't stop supporting the game. They are on thin ground as it is with the community.

To reiterate something already posted in this thread, EA no longer supports online play for its console sports franchises older than '05/'06 or so. If you want to play Madden '05 online against a buddy, too bad. You can't.

So with that in mind, I can't say I have much faith in EA's willingness to continue supporting older games, especially if those older games are part of franchises with new iterations out.

But the fact that the only option for people to play the game would be an illegal course guarantees EA can't stop supporting the game. They are on thin ground as it is with the community.

To reiterate something already posted in this thread, EA no longer supports online play for its console sports franchises older than '05/'06 or so. If you want to play Madden '05 online against a buddy, too bad. You can't.

So with that in mind, I can't say I have much faith in EA's willingness to continue supporting older games, especially if those older games are part of franchises with new iterations out.

Supporting online play for a franchise with yearly iterations and supporting large single player only games are a bit different.

That sordid business with paying actual money to get weapons in Bad Company.

The cock ripping DRM in Mass Effect, which ironically encourages pirating because people got paranoid of using up their three strikes.

Even when they succeed they manage to find someway to fail.

You know there are no microtransactions in Bad Company and no draconian DRM in Mass Effect, right? They decided against those things when people complained.

The truth of the matter is we hate EA when it's convenient to. We like them when it's not.

That's good for Bad Company, but the Mass Effect DRM still blows. I think I would've rather had it on some omnipotent program like Steam that attached the game to my account, so I can install and uninstall and play as much as I want, but in the current iteration if you so much as change a CD drive the game will recognize your system as a completely new system and use up one of your three strikes.

At the end of all three strikes of course means your copy of the game becoming obsolete.

I'm not saying EA doesn't produce good games, but really, everyone is justified giving them shit. They never owned up to when they used to be a sweatshop and just quietly glided over it and readjusted themselves for the sake of PR. They just have no class. A formal apology and a public acknowledgment is the least a company can do. It's like, "Oh look, it's the new toy maker. He use to molest all of his workers.... but he's a nice guy NOW."

Do you say this "So much as change your CD drive" backed up by fact, or are you just spewing random shit in the hope that it's right? Because I still don't think we know exactly what hardware changes will affect the install. I know adding a second HDD didn't affect mine in the least, and putting in a TV tuner and Wireless card didn't change mine either. There was a developer who changed out a GPU and it still recognized it as the same system.

And at the end of all three strikes you just need to call EA, and get more authentications, assuming you have a legit reason for using them all up.

I thought all the hate from EA stemmed from the death of game companies like Origin and Bullfrog after being aquired.

This is my general feeling on the matter. EA has been good about picking up new companies that put out good products. The problem is that instead of those companies blossoming into creative gems like Blizzard they get exploited and never reach that level of quality.

Each acquisition has warped the goals of the business from making something new and exciting and worthy of our $60, to making something familiar and profitable. Great for investors, bad for gamers.

Crytek made FarCry, great game, then EA aquired, they made far cry instincts, Crysis, and now Far Cry 2. So far not looking good.

Origin was one of the top companies for a long time and it may not have been EA's doing completely but the product that started getting to store shelves went to shit.

DICE made BF1942 and surprised everyone so EA quickly bought them up before BF2 came out. Next thing we've got BF2 special forces on the shelves 3 months after launch of BF2? (And it was a buggy POS). Then the booster packs, online stat tracking that kept people from playing on the unranked free servers. BF2142 and it's booster pack and now BF BC. It's not that these games are bad, they're just average. As soon as EA get's involved the company goes from excellence to average and just milks the franchise.

I think Hellgate London is a good example of what happens when EA becomes involved before there is a known brand to exploit. they tried to squeeze gamers for bucks on the initial product, Hellgate London and that failed in spectacular fashion.

What gaming needs today is smaller development houses that specialize in creating one product at a time. That is where I am most impressed by gaming. The stuff EA puts out is the fast food of gaming. We all deal with it from time to time but we'd love for some smaller places to take hold and put out higher quality products.

Rockstar/Take Two and Grand Theft Auto is a great example of this. Rockstar put out another fabulous game with GTA4 and once a company like EA gets involved they'll sit down and say, "Ok, no more of this ship it when it's done crap, you have 2 years to give us another title. And we want you to put in more of X and less of Y because our customers like X alot. And quality is not our priority, we want a box that says GTAV on the shelf by X date so we can make lots of money." They take the creative freedom out of the formula and take everything that is special about that company and toss it aside.

That is why no one like EA. It takes everything that is beautiful in this world and sucks the life right out of it.

Seriously, keep calling me a bullshitter though. Whatever makes you happy, even if its supporting one of the most asinine game protections systems of all time by purchasing the product.

You realize that neither of those say anything about how "if you so much as change your CD drive" it'll "Use up an activation"?

And one of them goes through a list of things that SecuROM doesn't actually do?(DISABLES YOUR FIREWALL AND YOUR CD DRIVES AND YOUR CD BURNING SOFTWARE!) And in fact seems to think that Maxis developed Mass Effect? And is backed up by a purely anecdotal piece of completely unsourced allegations? And the second one just goes on with a misunderstanding of the "Activations" v. "Installations", since Bioware clearly stated that it's 3 activations on unique machines, uninstalling wouldn't remove an activation, but there were unlimited installs on any activated machine? And hey look, Zilo found another reason the first one was dumb.

So yeah, I'll keep calling you a bullshitter 'till you come up with something that isn't bullshit.

The onus is on EA. Some people want them to do something, they get to decide to do it or not.
Like I said, I dont care. EA almost certainly will do it because, I mean, why the hell not? The reasons you listed as to why they wouldn't are outweighed by several things:

1) It is incredibly easy to remove copy protection from a game via a patch - as pirates have been proving for 10 years.

2) It is a PR boost for them.

3) It costs them nothing. They aren't going to make sales on an old game anyways.

Factors 1 and 3 are linked. It's easy to remove the DRM, but, and here's the kicker, do they want to? Despite the fact that it doesn't cost much, it still costs resources. Then of course there's also the issue of "Should we really remove our DRM now? Our titles are still on the budget rack. Removing it now would enable people to pirate a game of ours that is still selling!". Or of course, there's also the belief that maintaining older games in the series means that people will have less inclination to move on to the next version. Every little helps right?

I know what the term onus means. I also know that I don't believe that those factors you listed outweigh the costs and resources to enable a game for a small minority of users 5 years down the line. And evidently neither does EA, judging by the fact that the DRM for the multiplayer support in EA's older sports titles was never fixed. I can't understand why that wasn't fixed. If it's as easy as you say it is, and they truly want that positive PR, then why is that DRM still in place? If you can explain that to me then maybe I can understand your standpoint a bit better.

EA is not made up of morons. They know the games are being pirated. They hold no illusion in their minds that the DRM has been cracked. They're not going to avoid removing the DRM when it no longer works because they're afraid it might be pirated. If they do go back on what they've said about removing the DRM should the service ever stop being supported, then it will not be because they're concerned that the pirates might get it.

I agree, EA isn't made up of morons. They have no shortage of intelligent people there, I have no doubt they realise that the DRM has been cracked and is effectively useless. Given that premise, why hasn't the DRM been patched out as a result when they know it's no longer effective? That's the question I'm asking, I'm genuinely trying to understand why everyone thinks it's in EA's best interests to do so, that they'll naturally do so, but yet they still haven't done it with products that are no longer being supported, such as the aforementioned sports titles.

You say it's easy to do? Fine. You say they want to do it? OK. I will accept that premise. What I want to understand now is why they haven't removed it so far. Heck, it doesn't even have to be the online component titles. You say that they won't avoid removing the DRM from titles out of fears it might be pirated. OK I'll agree with that. As far as I have seen, they have not so far chosen to remove the DRM from a game that's been cracked, or from a game that's no longer supported. They may have done so for games where the DRM itself was causing critical issues in the first place, but I'm not sure whether that was EA or another company.

The problem is, the DRM is still there. If nothing else I believe that's a factor of the other two points I raised in that post. If you don't believe that to be the case, then just explain to me why, and maybe I can understand your standpoint a bit better.

Crap man, I don't know, maybe I'm just equating your viewpoint with other peoples and really you just had issue with that one point. If so, I'm sorry.

Is there really much difference with new IP's like this? A big solid company like Valve can afford to walk away from a publisher but smaller companies like Crytek and Flagship have no choice but to work with the publisher so even though they don't technically "own" them they have so much influence over them that they end up corrupting the product anyway.

And Crysis and Farcry are practically the same thing, one just has improved graphics. The experience is all too familiar.

I agree, EA isn't made up of morons. They have no shortage of intelligent people there, I have no doubt they realise that the DRM has been cracked and is effectively useless. Given that premise, why hasn't the DRM been patched out as a result when they know it's no longer effective? That's the question I'm asking, I'm genuinely trying to understand why everyone thinks it's in EA's best interests to do so, that they'll naturally do so, but yet they still haven't done it with products that are no longer being supported, such as the aforementioned sports titles.

You say it's easy to do? Fine. You say they want to do it? OK. I will accept that premise. What I want to understand now is why they haven't removed it so far. Heck, it doesn't even have to be the online component titles. You say that they won't avoid removing the DRM from titles out of fears it might be pirated. OK I'll agree with that. As far as I have seen, they have not so far chosen to remove the DRM from a game that's been cracked, or from a game that's no longer supported. They may have done so for games where the DRM itself was causing critical issues in the first place, but I'm not sure whether that was EA or another company.

The problem is, the DRM is still there. If nothing else I believe that's a factor of the other two points I raised in that post. If you don't believe that to be the case, then just explain to me why, and maybe I can understand your standpoint a bit better.

Crap man, I don't know, maybe I'm just equating your viewpoint with other peoples and really you just had issue with that one point. If so, I'm sorry.

Yeah, I have no idea why they haven't removed it already. That I just think they're being weird. But then again they do still have the infrastructure to support the DRM. I think they're thinking "Well if it's at least something of a challange for casual pirates they'll buy the game", which granted is stupid thinking in that one part, but I think it's a different ball game when their choice is say "Fuck you!" to everyone and getting shitty PR or say "Here no DRM!" and get good PR.

Is there really much difference with new IP's like this? A big solid company like Valve can afford to walk away from a publisher but smaller companies like Crytek and Flagship have no choice but to work with the publisher so even though they don't technically "own" them they have so much influence over them that they end up corrupting the product anyway.

And Crysis and Farcry are practically the same thing, one just has improved graphics. The experience is all too familiar.

I don't know about Crytek, but there is far, far more to Flagship than you'd think. Frankly, EA's involvement with Hellgate was limited exclusively to publishing the game. Because the original publisher, Namco BANDAI, simply didn't have the wherewithal or organisation for such a project.

I've heard two conflicting rumours about EA and Flagship. One said that EA tried to buy Flagship and was turned down. The other says that EA had zero interest in Flagship after entering into the publishing deal. Considering what went down with Flagship and how EA is still trying to buy up a much larger company even after being repeatedly turned down, I know which one is more likely.

The EA hate stems from nothing more than their old habit of buying beloved dev houses and then either squandering the purchase or driving them into the ground. This DRM issue is more part of the larger 'nerd rage' against any kind of copy protection (effective or not).

But the fact that the only option for people to play the game would be an illegal course guarantees EA can't stop supporting the game. They are on thin ground as it is with the community.

To reiterate something already posted in this thread, EA no longer supports online play for its console sports franchises older than '05/'06 or so. If you want to play Madden '05 online against a buddy, too bad. You can't.

So with that in mind, I can't say I have much faith in EA's willingness to continue supporting older games, especially if those older games are part of franchises with new iterations out.

Supporting online play for a franchise with yearly iterations and supporting large single player only games are a bit different.

Sure, but at the very least it shows a willingness to pull the rug out from paying customers (likely in order to force a purchase of the latest version). There is no reason to assume that at some point the same attention to support, or lack thereof, will be given to non-sports titles, especially in the case of a franchise with regular new installments. If they're willing to leave customers in the lurch with A, there is no strong reason to assume they wouldn't do the same with B.

It's not a problem specific to EA. As I mentioned before, I have a general distaste for games that rely on a perpetual checking in system. I understand and respect the need for anti-piracy measures, I'm just not a fan of measures like this. (And of course, the issue with the EA sports games isn't one of anti-piracy measures.)

But the fact that the only option for people to play the game would be an illegal course guarantees EA can't stop supporting the game. They are on thin ground as it is with the community.

To reiterate something already posted in this thread, EA no longer supports online play for its console sports franchises older than '05/'06 or so. If you want to play Madden '05 online against a buddy, too bad. You can't.

So with that in mind, I can't say I have much faith in EA's willingness to continue supporting older games, especially if those older games are part of franchises with new iterations out.

Supporting online play for a franchise with yearly iterations and supporting large single player only games are a bit different.

Sure, but at the very least it shows a willingness to pull the rug out from paying customers (likely in order to force a purchase of the latest version). There is no reason to assume that at some point the same attention to support, or lack thereof, will be given to non-sports titles, especially in the case of a franchise with regular new installments. If they're willing to leave customers in the lurch with A, there is no strong reason to assume they wouldn't do the same with B.

It's not a problem specific to EA. As I mentioned before, I have a general distaste for games that rely on a perpetual checking in system. I understand and respect the need for anti-piracy measures, I'm just not a fan of measures like this. (And of course, the issue with the EA sports games isn't one of anti-piracy measures.)

Pulling the rug out? Isn't that a bit too colourful? It may be mercenary to say so, but they do that on their sports games to encourage the purchase of the new edition. And when you consider the general fanatical devotion of theirs sports game's audience, it wouldn't be too far-fetched to suggest that the number of people still trying to play a four year old sports game online would be fairly small.

But the fact that the only option for people to play the game would be an illegal course guarantees EA can't stop supporting the game. They are on thin ground as it is with the community.

To reiterate something already posted in this thread, EA no longer supports online play for its console sports franchises older than '05/'06 or so. If you want to play Madden '05 online against a buddy, too bad. You can't.

So with that in mind, I can't say I have much faith in EA's willingness to continue supporting older games, especially if those older games are part of franchises with new iterations out.

Supporting online play for a franchise with yearly iterations and supporting large single player only games are a bit different.

Sure, but at the very least it shows a willingness to pull the rug out from paying customers (likely in order to force a purchase of the latest version). There is no reason to assume that at some point the same attention to support, or lack thereof, will be given to non-sports titles, especially in the case of a franchise with regular new installments. If they're willing to leave customers in the lurch with A, there is no strong reason to assume they wouldn't do the same with B.

It's not a problem specific to EA. As I mentioned before, I have a general distaste for games that rely on a perpetual checking in system. I understand and respect the need for anti-piracy measures, I'm just not a fan of measures like this. (And of course, the issue with the EA sports games isn't one of anti-piracy measures.)

Pulling the rug out? Isn't that a bit too colourful?

If it is, only a little. I like to play some sports games, but I don't buy them annually. My friends and I try to coordinate which games we get so we can play together online. For minor sports -- tennis and what have you -- we're buying in order to play one another, and we're buying a game we know we won't replace for some years. (We're still playing Links on the Xbox, for instance.)

So yeah, to me, suddenly pulling support for online play, a feature that was 70% of our purchasing decision, is pulling the rug out from under us. After all, we bought the game to play against one another online. That would be a major feature of a product we paid for being removed due to lack of support. In some cases, playing against friends might be the only reason I bought the game. Forcing authentication and then nixing support for it would render the game all but useless to me.

It may be mercenary to say so, but they do that on their sports games to encourage the purchase of the new edition.

Yes, I've said that several times this thread. Doesn't make it any easier to swallow or something I'm any more inclined to agree with or support. In many ways, it makes it even more crass.

And when you consider the general fanatical devotion of theirs sports game's audience, it wouldn't be too far-fetched to suggest that the number of people still trying to play a four year old sports game online would be fairly small.

Frankly, the numbers are irrelevant. My point is simple: Save in the case of MMOs and the like, if you've bought a fully functioning game, you should expect that game to remain fully functioning as long as your hardware is good. When games require checking in each time in order to play (again, subscription games aside), you run the risk of a game becoming a coaster if a developer/publisher decided not to support it, goes under, or whatever. These EQ sports games display an (imperfect) example of something close to that taking place. I think that's unfortunate.

But the fact that the only option for people to play the game would be an illegal course guarantees EA can't stop supporting the game. They are on thin ground as it is with the community.

To reiterate something already posted in this thread, EA no longer supports online play for its console sports franchises older than '05/'06 or so. If you want to play Madden '05 online against a buddy, too bad. You can't.

So with that in mind, I can't say I have much faith in EA's willingness to continue supporting older games, especially if those older games are part of franchises with new iterations out.

Supporting online play for a franchise with yearly iterations and supporting large single player only games are a bit different.

1. Not all the games EA cut servers for are annual franchises. Several games that have been cut, such as MVP Baseball 07 and NFL Street 3, do not have sequels. Others, like Burnout Dominator (PS2, PSP) do not have sequels on the same platform.

2. I can still play old 2k Sports games online, both for defunct (NFL 2k_) and active (NBA 2k_) annual series. Granted, the lobby is probably pretty deserted these days, but it still works. In fact, with College Hoops 2k8, 2k Sports has added official support for user-created rosters so you can just download next year's rosters off XBL into last year's game. No more buying a brand new game just for roster updates.

Is there really much difference with new IP's like this? A big solid company like Valve can afford to walk away from a publisher but smaller companies like Crytek and Flagship have no choice but to work with the publisher so even though they don't technically "own" them they have so much influence over them that they end up corrupting the product anyway.

And Crysis and Farcry are practically the same thing, one just has improved graphics. The experience is all too familiar.

Crytek's hardly a small company- it's not like they had no choice in the matter. They jumped from Ubisoft to EA for a reason. In any case, look around for some of the video interviews John Carmack gave when they announced Rage would be published through EA Partners (same division that handles Orange Box, Crysis, Hellgate, etc). He seems to think it's a good program, and I guess he's a pretty smart dude.

And Crysis was way different from Far Cry. I only bought the game recently (based on a Crysis thread in this very forum) and found it to be fabulous- and I hated both the Crysis demo and Far Cry.

And even if crysis was a carbon copy of far cry, it's not like that's a bad thing, and the only other game that I'd say was remotely similar gameplay-wise would be like stalker anyway. More to the point, I'm inclined to take your opinion with a bucket full of salt since Crytek didn't even have anything to do with far cry after the original, and EA didn't do anything with flagship other than publish hellgate. (And the whole point of the thread is that this EA isn't the same one that killed origin)